I don’t know how this has happened, but original rave nutters The KLF have had some of the rarer albums made available to purchase on iTunes.

It’s a bit of a surprise because these album are sample-tastic jail bait, and one of them was not even officially released at the time (such as The White Room Original Motion Picture Soundtrack from 1990, which differs considerably from The White Room, which was released to international acclaim in 1991).

Pick of the bunch of KLF album re-issues, for me anyway, are both the band’s ambient albums from 1990, Chill Out and Space (which is sometimes credited as artist name Space). Both albums were made in collaboration with Alex Patterson, who went on to form the mighty Orb, and his influence is palpable.

Similar in style and structure to The Orb at their most out there, both albums were cut from tape recordings of live ambient dj sets, and feature a gentle shower of found and pre-prepared sound to make you feel like you’re floating on a cosmic river. You can easily get lost in these records. To resurrect that old cliché, they really take you on a journey, maaan. Underground culture hasn’t felt this psychedelic in a long time.

The KLF are one of the greatest “joke” bands of all time, and I don’t mean that in a “comedy band” or “wacky” way, I mean more in the style of the Merry Pranksters, or the Bonzos. Situationist humor. They took their original name (The Justified Ancients Of Mu Mu) from the Illuminatus! trilogy, after all. They pushed some sharp critique but mixed it up with a liberal dose of the bizarre. Just look at that picture of them with Tammy Wynette. It’s genius!

Don’t forget that they brought a dead sheep to the Brit Awards, played live at that bloated, complacent shindig with thrash metallers Extreme Noise Terror, and fired fake machine guns into the audience while they did it. Oh yeah, and this one time they burned a million pounds. .

At the time these albums were first released they were seen by some as mere novelties, curios from a band who made it hard to take themselves seriously. Time has been very kind to them however, and over twenty years later they still retain their charm, and that elusive sense of magic.

Maybe The KLF appearing on iTunes is a huge cosmic joke on all our expenses. Or maybe Caughty and Drummond badly need some cash. Either way these albums are worth getting, before they’re possibly withdrawn. Again.

Ireland has produced some of the best music recently. There is the King of Disco and Performer Extraordinaire, The Niallist (DM’s very own Niall O’Conghaile); the beautiful and brilliant Solar Bears; and now a wonderful duo called I Am The Cosmos.

Since their launch over a year ago, I Am The Cosmos duo Ross Turner and Cian Murphy have been producing their very own distinctive brand of fabulous, soulful, electronic music. They have performed a series of live shows, which brought them considerable interest from BBC radio’s Across The Line music show, and enthusiastic reviews from the music blogs No Fear of Pop, 20JazzFunkGreats and Nialler9.

Recently, Ross and Cian have been putting the finishing touches to their highly anticipated debut album, from which Dangerous Minds are proud to present an Exclusive Premier of the track “Lost Rhythm” by I Am The Cosmos.

Going by this and their previous single “Yves Klein Blue” Ross and Cian are definitely on to a winner.

Born Brian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno on the 15th May, 1948, Eno almost has a job description for every one of his names as a musician, a composer, a producer, a visual artist, a writer, a collector of pornography and an innovator of different musical forms. But Eno is more than the sum of his parts, he is a great inspiration to go take a-hold of life and do as much is as is possible. As he suggested in the documentary Another Green World:

“All of the encouragement from modern life is to tell you to pay attention to yourself and take control of things.”

Though he does go on to say we can also surrender, get by, and transcend, I prefer to opt for the starring role, rather than being an extra in the crowd scene or exiting stage left, chased by a bear. And so should we all, for this is your movie, and you are its star.

For me, that’s what I like best about Eno - he’s a concept to do better, to try different, to learn more. And perhaps to be a little nicer on the side.

Brian Eno: Another Green World is a profile of Eno, made for the BBC’s Arena series.

From the schoolboy who would cycle to the seashore to look for fossils, Eno has been driven by the search for the connections between things. Here, he gives an insight into his fascinating and unique take on the nature of music today. Eno discusses what music means to him, and how he uses it to create an alternate reality, as well as the influences of modern technology in changing the way we are able to understand and develop both music and sound.

You’ll learn bits and bobs from this documentary, though it never really seems to get much further than dusting the surface of this complex and talented man.

Bonus clip of Brian Eno interviewed on ‘The Tube’ from 1986, after the jump…